Last week saw the inaugural Red Bull 50/50 Event take place in the CairnGorm Mountain resort, combining snowboarding or skiing with downhill mountain biking to create the ultimate extreme sports biathlon. Saturday was a busy day with over 100 competitors from across the UK travelling to Scotland to take part in the event including Red Bull rider Kye Forte. The qualifiers kicked off at 10 am, which saw competitors set two timed runs on both the snow and dirt sections of the course, which were then combined, to give them their start time for the main race.
The main event commenced with a series of 15, 5-man heats from the top of the mountain range, leading to a 5km mixed terrain which separated the riders from the finish line. Racing across snow and dirt in one day made for a tough competition and pushed the competitors to their limits.
Riders faced many challenges with obstacles in the form of moguls, berms and kickers but the main speed trap seemed to be the transition phase from skis/snowboard to mountain bike. Still some managed to get their bindings off in super quick time and first to the finish line was local boy Oliver Carter who completed the course in an impressive time of 12 minutes 9 seconds to become the first winner of Red Bull 50/50. Second place was snapped up by Liam Moynihan of Dudes of Hazard fame, with a speedy time of 12 minutes 41 seconds and following in third place was Frazer McNeil with his time of 12 minutes 52 seconds.
